Japanese teen traced as owner of tsunami soccer ball found in Alaska

This soccer ball is believed to have drifted from Rikuzentakata, Japan, to Alaska following the March 2011 tsunami.

By Arata Yamamoto, NBC News, in Tokyo

A Japanese teenager has identified himself as the owner of a soccer ball that washed up on an Alaska beach last week – the first traceable debris to arrive in the United States from last year's tsunami.

Marker pen writing on the soccer ball identified the 16-year-old and the name of his school.

The soccer ball and a volleyball were discovered by David Baxter, a technician working at a radar station on remote Middleton Island in the Gulf of Alaska, Doug Helton of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration wrote ina blog post last week.

Japan’s Kyodo news agency said Murakami was at home at the time of the tsunami disaster in March 2011 but managed to escape the waves by running to higher ground with his pet dog.

Kyodo via Reuters

Misaki Murakami, 16, says he is the owner of a soccer ball that was found on the shore of a remote Alaska island.

His family lost everything, including their home, and are currently living in temporary housing provided by the local government.

Murakami told the news agency Sunday that he had been searching for his family's belongings but that until the ball was found he had had no luck.

Prized possessionThe ball was a gift from his former homeroom teacher and his 13 classmates when he had to change schools in the same area seven years ago.

He said it was a prized possession, which he always kept hanging in a net next to his bed.

Kyodo News via AP

David and Yumi Baxter hold the soccer ball and a volleyball at their home in Alaska.
Doug Helton of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said that there wasn't enough information on the volleyball for Japanese officials to locate its possible owner.

Murakami spoke with Baxter on the phone to thank him for finding his treasured ball.

The magnitude 9.0 earthquake off Japan's northeast coast on March 11, 2011, triggered a 75-foot wall of water that flattened waterfront towns, killing 16,000. About 3,000 people are still unaccounted for. The tsunami triggered a crisis at Tokyo Electric Power's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, forcing tens of thousands of people to flee in the world's worst nuclear accident in 25 years.

An earthquake, a tsunami, a nuclear meltdown -- residents of Japan's northeast coast suffered through three intertwined disasters after a massive 9.0 magnitude temblor struck off the coast on March 11, 2011.